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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26623366">For her</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/StopitGerald/pseuds/StopitGerald'>StopitGerald</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Fallout 4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 06:36:04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,674</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26623366</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/StopitGerald/pseuds/StopitGerald</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Nick and Aurora- for Willow</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Female Sole Survivor/Nick Valentine</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>13</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>For her</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">Nick’s never really been a romantic. He‘s never had a reason to be. Detective work never made him soft or sweet, and the Commonwealth isn’t exactly a good place to foster love of any sort. If anything, his work, and life, consists mostly of the opposite of love, safety, those nice things in short supply these days. Missing persons and murder cases never close with a happily ever after. He’d say the closest thing he’s felt to any sort of love since he’d woken up in the institute’s landfill is Ellie’s friendship as a colleague, but he’d venture to say that doesn’t count. Not really.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">But then the TV dinner thawed out and fell into his life with a heap of disheveled auburn hair and a story to tell, and well. It was all downhill from there, as they say. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">Aurora has changed a lot of things in his life- small things, but big things too. Things he couldn’t face on his own. He’s sure if he sat down and wracked his processor he could recall the moments where they moved from acquaintances by chance, marked by her case for her missing son, to friends. And then on from friends to... something more. He still isn’t sure what to label it. Nick Valentine, the prewar Nick Valentine- well he’s sure that guy would’ve known what to call it- he was a real ladykiller, as far as he remembers. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">He isn’t sure if it’s the fact that he’s a synth, 200 plus years of being a detective, or 200 years of not even thinking of romance, but he finds himself... bashful. Skittish. Whatever it is, whatever it’s called, he’d never thought any sort of relationship was possible between him and her- not even with the way he’d catch her looking at him sometimes. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">Aurora is a prewar dame- her hair full and glossy in the right lighting, her face soft and structured, with pretty lips and startlingly captivating green eyes. Her hands smooth and fair, with the softest skin in the entire ‘wealth. And her figure- well, it’s better he not go down that road right now, he might blow a circuit just thinking of her. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">All of those things added up- it made no sense to him when she’d gaze from across the room and nip her bottom lip as she stared- admired, even- at him. The way she insisted on sticking close, the way she wanted him to be her companion, not just to help her find Shaun, but always. It startled him at first, but he couldn’t deny how wonderful being close to her really was- is.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">Be it all as it may, Nick Valentine doesn’t dwell in the past- not anymore. She’d helped him outgrow that, outgrow the Nick Valentine of before. Starting with her, at his side, he could build a new self, one that he doesn’t owe to the world before the bomb. One that he owes to himself and himself only.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">Well, and Aurora. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">The sound of tide pulling at the shore gets him out of his funk, out of his thoughts. He sits back in his chair, from his desk, and gazes out the window, over the sea and the sand that lies beyond. He’d been trying to read some reports, but thoughts of her had caught him up like a whirlwind. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">He’s in their home on Spectacle, sitting in the office chair and desk that Aurora makes especially sure to include in all of their abodes. He needs somewhere comfortable to focus, she insists, and he sometimes finds himself forgetting that kindness and love and thoughtfulness didn’t die with the bomb- it’d survived in that freezer, in her heart. Somehow he’s been lucky enough to win it. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">He rolls his shoulders and flexes his metal joints, sighing and leaning forward on his elbows to look out the window more clearly. Documents forgotten, he admires the surf washing against the sand and the waves crashing over the pepperings of stones and boulders further out. The sky is a hazy blue, late afternoon, and the sun is making to set. It’ll be a pretty one tonight, he’s sure. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">But his focus on the scenery is disrupted by a shuffling and a door creaking behind him, to the doorway of the room he’s in. He spins in his chair to greet the intruder- and they bask in the doorway in his gaze like it’s a spotlight- To hell with the sunset, he thinks, there’s absolutely nothing on this planet that can beat this- beat her.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">Aurora just quirks her lips into a smile wordlessly and crosses the room in three quick strides to come and stand in front of him in the chair. He admires the sentiment, actions always speak louder than words, after all. Her hand moves from her side to brush fingertips against his jaw, then his shoulder, and he looks up from under the brim of his hat to meet her eyes, and he can’t help the grin that meets her own. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">“Hey, Nick,” her returning smile turns devious and those eyes sparkle with mischief, but before he can react, she moves forward, bending down slightly, and swipes his hat off of his head in a flash. He isn’t even able to begin complaining about it before she leans down and places a solid, lingering kiss on the top of his head. She stills there for a moment, and any rebuttal he has dies in his throat as she cups the side of his face, and his eyes slide closed.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">She pulls back bubbling with laughter, and replaces his hat gently. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">“Hey, Aurora,” her face wavers with fondness before she lilts forward against his form in the chair, and he gratefully accepts her. His arms curl around her back as she awkwardly positions her legs on either side of the office chair, huffing irritatedly when she can’t get comfortable In her straddle of his lap. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">He pats her shoulder and kisses the side of her face, where her hair meets her forehead. She’s tense, her shoulders raised and her back muscles clenched. She works a lot, too hard, and she never thinks of herself. Only her duties and her people. She stays up late, skips meals, works herself to the bone.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">“If you’re not careful, your fingers are gonna start looking like mine,” he chides, pressing the blunt tips of his exposed metal fingers to her shoulder blade for emphasis. He doesn’t have to elaborate, she knows he’s getting onto her for working too much. She huffs in playful annoyance and relaxes against his touch, letting out some tension. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">“Don’t worry about me,” she reassures him, sitting back on his lap to look him in the eyes. He tries not to think about what it looks like from her perspective. He hit the jackpot, he knows it. A girl like her looking at a guy like him the way she does... </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">She tilts her head forward to rest her forehead against his cheek, humming thoughtfully. He skims his good hand from her shoulder to the small of her back, stroking her skin and feeling her melt into him as she relaxes. The sun is starting to set, and she’s falling with it. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">“‘Should get you to bed,” he hums, and she sighs against his cheek, puckering her lips to kiss whatever she can reach of his face playfully. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">“Nah,” she winds her arms around his neck, giggling, shifting her weight to kiss closer to his mouth- and there it is- what he’s been waiting for since she waltzed in from The Castle. She kisses him on the lips and it’s always like the first time all over again when she does. Sparks flying, ankle-popping, the whole nine yards, and he’ll tell her as such every time he gets the chance.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">“‘Love you,” she breathes, against his chin, his jaw, leisurely leaving kisses in her wake, and he’d shudder beneath her if he could. She’s good at that.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">“Love you too, doll,” and he does, more so with every time he says it, more so with every breath he takes. She’s brought him more happiness and more affection than he thought could even be possible for someone in his... position. He isn’t sure he deserves it-</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">“I know that look,” she interrupts, cupping his face with stern, firm, but gentle hands, “don’t overthink it,” </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">And he sighs, nods once in response. He’s dumbfounded at how well she reads him, how well she cares for him, no matter what. But tonight, especially tonight, here on Spectacle with the sun setting, she’s the one who needs cared for, with how hard she works.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">He makes to stand, shifting his strength to his legs and bracing his arms under her thighs to scoop her against his chest, carrying her. She giggles with every motion as he steels himself to ensure she doesn’t fall, her thighs slip to lock around his lower back.</span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">He takes her to their room for rest and a drink, to relax, he stresses. Somehow, he manages to wrangle her into the bed, despite protests, and she gives out beneath him with a pout. She sips a cola while he strums metal fingers through auburn hair and over fair skin as he takes a minute to admire her and all she’s done. The words linger in his throat, all of the undying affection he could pour onto her in a rush, but it’s better when it’s sugar sweet and honey slow. It’s better said in small phrases here and there and not tossed down like a shitty cup of coffee from Joe’s that he knows she remembers. He likes it like that, easy. </span>
</p><p class="p3"> </p><p class="p2">
  <span class="s2">He supposes he is a bit of a romantic, when it comes down to it. In the way he admires her over any sunset, in the way he touches her, and in the way he’d follow her to the ends of the Earth if she requested. But for her, really, he could be anything. </span>
</p>
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